Tuesday, August 07, 2007

It Could Happen to You

Yeah, you, with the half-finished hat and the goofy grin on your face, and the itty-bitty stash that still fits in a wicker basket by the couch. I'm talking to you.

Stop sniffing that fresh hank of merino for a minute and listen. It may be your last chance.

Feeling pretty good lately, are ya? Enjoying your first forays into the local yarn shop? Contemplating the esoteric pleasures of socks, cables, fair isle, lace? Dancing feverishly to the siren song of 100,000 souls given over to the orgiastic joys of the yarn and the needles?

Well, snap out of it. It's not too late for you to get away, before you become what I've become.

All I wanted was a long scarf. That's all. Maybe with stripes. But you couldn't buy a really long scarf back then, in 1992. The best you'd find in the shops was a flimsy strip of woven plaid about four feet long. Pathetic.

So I bought some wool and I learned to knit. I made my six-foot scarf. And I thought, that was pretty fun. Maybe I should buy some more yarn.

Flash forward fifteen years.

I am still knitting. In fact, I am a knitter. Perhaps I am even a Knitter. There are even indications that I may be a KNITTER.

I write a knitting blog. Some people who read the blog will decide, on occasion, to send me a knitterly token of affection through the post.

One such reader lives in Japan. She and I have never met. She wrote to let me know that a package would be arriving on my doorstep. In the package there would be "some roving" to spin. Please note: "some roving."

I came home from work and the package had arrived. A package of considerable dimensions. As promised, it did contain "some roving." Here is a picture.

Each of those two balls of roving measures nearly 15 inches in diameter. Each of those two balls is larger than my whole head.

This, newbie, is the kind of thing that may happen to you if do not drop the needles right this minute.

You may come home one day and find that someone you have never met, who lives across the ocean in a country you've never visited, has taken considerable time, trouble, and expense to ship you a box filled almost entirely by two gigantic balls of animal hair.

Wow. That's a lot of hair, can't wait to see what it looks like as yarn. Lots and lots of yarn.

I learned to knit in 1970ish, I don't really remember not knowing how to knit. I survived the "it's not cool to knit years" somehow and now that it's cool, I find strangers gifting me with yarn. Mostly it's acrylic to knit baby hats for the nearby hospital, but I'm drowning in it. I can guarantee that it's never been as cool as your ginormous rovings.

It's so nice to have something to look forward to ;) I'm glad I'm a (K)nitter - that's transitional, I'm not quite at Knitter yet.. but I'm getting there. Thanks for a glimpse of the future, it looks great!

Like Cherice said, I learned to knit when some people thought it wasn't cool. I, on the other hand, thought it was cool that no-one else was knitting. (I guess I'm not a bandwagon-jumper-onner.) I don't know if anyone else is tired of the "Not your grandmother's hobby" crap, but it really grates...I gave away my stash to a hat knitter just after Christmas, and am now restocking with more interesting stuff. I've never been gifted with any, but I guess that's something to aspire to. Good luck with the rovings; that should keep you busy for a while!

Oh, yeah. For me, it was a baby sweater. Just one, nice wolly red sweater for the new baby. The world was awash in pink and baby blue, and you know, just one bright red sweater. Yeah. I remember the stash fits in one basket days. Now, uhm what kind of roving is that? Are ther some kind of special Japanese sheep that I need to obsess over? Gasp- are they the sheep that are made into KUREYON? must google.must google, now.

So, what, some kind of two-color patterned rustic fishing-villager sweater to get you through the Chicago winter -- first in the spinning and knitting, then in the wearing. Very handsome stuff.

I think my stash-in-one basket phase lasted about two weeks, unless you count the years I spent as a penniless, knitting high school student.

I just spent two days ordering 9 cardigans worth of discontinued and no longer available when it's gone Jaeger wools. The advantage of taking up or returning to an avocation as an adult is more control over the money you have to spend on it. Sort of.

Resistance is futile! I've only just started to succumb to the sock knitting. I wonder how long I have before I'm knitting lace and spinning and dyeing. I suppose we all just have to bow to the inevitable.

Wow, I knew you said it was a lot, but goodness. I did not realize it was going to be that much hair!!! Exciting.

If it would not mess it up, I would request that you roll around in it and giggle in delight. I would ask if I could, but there is probably some unspoken rule about wallowing in another man's hairy balls of roving.

how cool is that!What a lovely thing to happen to a lovely knitter... er, handsome Knitter ... er um, taking my foot back out of my mouth now, since we know you're a KNITTER.But does this mean that you are also a spinner? or perhaps, a Spinner?

"hey you, drop those needles right now. Knitting is a soft drug, a gateway that could lead to all kinds of harder stuff, like ....crotchet, lace, or.....spinning. Just wait until you're shopping in a farmer's field and picking the sheep out personally, and then shearing them.... you'll be sorry."

I find it completely charming that knitters express affection by sending other knitters tokens of affection. It is the knitter equivalent to a love letter, gifted ipod, or huge box of Godiva. So charming, so sweet.

Franklin, you are a fine, decent gentleman. Your post is a wonderful way to acknowlege her gift. Plus, it is funny.

I am so glad you write this blog and that I was lucky enough to find it. In it, you display what I still believe we humans really are. The popular media may not go for it - no real cruelty, for example - but that's all for the best. Such a grand place to go to; to rest and laugh.

I have been lurking for awhile now. I love your writing and the christening shawl had me in tears. I have been a Knitter for two years and it has brought me an amazing circle of friends (including blog friends). I've considered learning to spin, but am afraid of falling down that hole. I'm thinking it may be deeper than the knitting one.

franklin, i love you even more now. i just saw that you also have the peanuts collections on your shelf!!! what a fabulous thing to see from someone who i can't wait to meet one day.looking forward to knitting with you and perhaps trading favorite strips.cyn from nashville

This post is aimed at me. Yeah me, with my hat and t-shirt and the grin on my face because I cast off the t-shirt last night. I'm not worried though... I have plans for one pair of socks and one sweater, um, maybe two, but then I'll definitely be done. Yep. No problem.

Thanks for the warning. Too late. I started with a crochet hook as soon as I was big enough to get off my grandmothers lap. Now my dear. There is no hope. Only love and joy and where can I hide the next box before my husband comes home.

I think you know you're a Knitter when Ravelry sends people to your blog .... which, by the way, should be your next warning - BLOG ADDICTION - spending every spare moment at the computer, searching for the internet cafes when you're away from your usual supplier at home, sleepless at night when you haven't had your daily dose, in dreamy euphoria when you get a hit that is just out of this world, neglecting your usual duties, eating baked beans out of the tin over a keyboard - I could go on, but please - warn them all what happens once they taste blogland.

My visiting knit victim was taken with the capelet in the Vogue Knitting 25th edition. She was less impressed when informed no, I do not have this yarn in the stash. (shocking, I know) So we looked it up and she nearly fell out when informed that the designated yarn for that thing was about $500. Yikes! So, we stash dove. Now, this was a major undertaking, since I had told her that to my knowledge, I had one skein of 100% cashmere around here somewhere but had taken it off my desk (where I could pat it but the yarn thieving animals were also stealing it) we were hunting that up so that she could pat it. Now, while hunting for that, we patted many a yarn (it's a multi-room stash) and many were considered and discarded (itchy, don't have enough, wrong gauge, etc) when she chanced upon my bag of odd ball Montera and Maya. Pat, pat, pat, pat. Sorry the Maya is discontinued. Can we make this cabled hat from Montera? - why yes. Particularly since I can order you up some additional natural ASAP. So, we leap right from learning knitting and purling on a swatch of, shall we say, interesting configuration, to knitting this hat. Which has 5 pieces, cables in multi directions, and tassles. She already has decided to nix the bobbles, so we have some knitter attitude in the making. And we're off into learning charts. Hit the road running, she did. We're on row 11 of the first section. At this rate it'll be done by Xmas, if she persists. If not, and it's abandoned here, I will have the hard choice of whether to finish it for her (bad example I think) or not (I hate a UFO hanging around)

I have been trying to teach my seven year old son to knit, at his insistence, not mine. He picked out some blue and green Malabridgio (C'mon it's 4:20 AM< so what if I can't spell?). He announced today he was "giving up knitting but Can I keep my yarn?"

Ah, inspiration for another ten or fifteen pages in book number 3...of the knitters,yarn,animals series...good job Franklin! Spin it up and you have a few pages in the yarn book...knit it up and you have a self portrait for the knitters book...what a gift.

I found your after somone referenced it on ravelry. What a perfect post to come in on... because I am just such a newbie down to the half-finished hat though I may be a bit further on since my stash is already necessitating creative storage solutions.In any case, I'll definitely be back as I am unfortunately beyond the stage where I can really be warned off. :D

I stumbled upon your blog after someone said your little one had been christened my Albus Dumbledor. -=giggle=- Then I read this post and I can't stop laughing. You could kill a man with those Balls. Um... -=starts laughing=- You know what I mean.

wow thats awsome!!!and I consider myself a newbie, and no.. Im not listening...today I went to 2 LYS for the first time, they are far from home but it was worth it.. I came back with the basics (not that I didn't have any lol),and right now Im casting on but can't figure out if I have to knit in the round, it says to use circular needles but it doesnt say anything else... anyway.. I m glad I found your blog :)

Franklin, I do love you. perhaps more than Dolores. Really. If I had two head-sized balls of roving in my house, I'd mail it to you. Just because you are sheer delight and you always get it just right.

Copyright and Posting Notice

All original content of this blog, both words and images, is held in copyright by F. Habit. Use of any kind, in any medium, for any reason without express, prior written consent is prohibited.

Permission is not granted for the posting of any content from this site to Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, or any other Web site.

Please do not provide links to any product, service, organization or cause when leaving comments unless directly related to the topic of the post. Unsolicited advertising will be deleted and repeat offenders will be blocked.

When in doubt, please ask. I'm not mean, I'm just committed to preserving the quality of experience for my readers.